Lenny & Les

Yup. After several 15+ hour days, we finally pulled it off. The 13th annual American Music Masters has come to a close. Lotta work? Yes. Exhausted? Yes. Hungover? A little. Starry-eyed? Just over Lenny Kaye. For those of you who don't know the punk pioneer Patti Smith, you should go buy her album "Horses" right now. She is known as the punk poet - bringing elegant lyrics to the aggressive style of punk tinted with gorgeous guitar solos by Lenny Kaye, her now ex-husband and still friend and collaborator. I have loved Patti Smith and Her Band since about the 8th grade when I was doing research on female punk musicians. (I had also discovered Siouxie, X, the Slits, and others, but Patti - perhaps because she was the most melodic and artsy - was my fave. And who doesn't love Lenny's fantastic solos that were just on the brink of being Something Else Other Than Punk? He is just too talented to play just I-IV-V chords.) Anyway, Lenny Kaye is on my list of people that I Go GaGa For Because They're Great. The list includes Prince, David Bowie, and Patti Smith. And of course, by extension, Wendy & Lisa (Prince's songwriting twin guitarists) and Lenny Kaye. And he totally lived up to my insanely high expectations. He is sweet, kind, funny, intelligent, and attentive. He thinks it's hilarious that I go so GaGa and he agreed with my list: he said he nearly fell over when he first met Prince. We hung out, we danced, he sang me happy birthday. And he said if ever Patti and I are in NYC at the same time, he'll have us both over for dinner. He loved the tecno-cumbia I played him AND my Halloween costume I showed him. He fully expects a draft of my latest chapter. And he was serious. I'm still reeling.

Although I am not a guitarist, I recognize good guitar playing. We had Slash, Richie Sambora, Dennis Coffey, Skunk Baxter, James Burton, Duane Eddy, Steve Lukather, the Ventures, and others at this show. They're great. But Les Paul? He's 93 and STILL playing like a maniac. He is hilarious and entertaining and sweet and a hell of a player. And I listened to Les Paul and Mary Ford growing up because my mom and nana liked them really well. And then all of the sudden I'm sitting next to him keeping him company while he waits to go on stage? How did I get this gig? Seriously. It doesn't seem real. It was hard, hard work. But it was exciting, and I learned a LOT.

And then Les kissed me on the cheek. Wow.